Our feelings tend to produce a kind of bi-polar roller coaster for us to try to exist on: ratcheting up to “highs” and then screaming down the slope into “lows”.

If one can first of all SEE this and secondly exert some kind of mastery over those feelings, the ride levels out.

It’s still a glorious ride. And feelings are still very much a part of it. But we have increased say in how high we ratchet up, how low we sink . . . and now long we stay there.

Rather than riding in a cart at the whim of mechanical chains and gravity . . . we have brakes; wings; rockets; and a steering wheel! To very great effect, WE can exercise control over where our feelings will take us.

I think it’s possible but it would require very strict self-discipline. And of course, this would only apply to that – self. We can’t moderate the world but we can do what we’re able to so we can live within moderate limits.

When you say moderation, I’m thinking diet, exercise, time management, etc., without straying or scumming to “cheat days.”

I would presume this would require strict planning and an impressive level of discipline in all aspects of life.

While no doubt an enviable pursuit, I could never make a serious attempt at something like that; I don’t know anyone that has ever achieved this.

Maybe Tony Robbins can do it.

The book I am reading, Homo Deus, makes the statement that the desire for excess, pleasure, and the like is the only reason anything survives.

The example given was a squirrel that finds a nut. When the squirrel eats, it feels pleasure as a reward for having spent the day foraging. The more it eats, the more pleasure it will feel – even if it doesn’t need to eat more. But once nice and fat, it is more likely to survive and successfully mate. Mating, obviously, also provides excitement and pleasure.

The genes that dictate pleasure are therefore passed on and now you have more squirrels pursuing pleasures.

Now, if a squirrel feels no pleasure, does it pursue anything? What does a squirrel know about a sustainable population and nutrition?

You can say the same for humans, I think. At least until now, since we understand exactly what we need and how much will sustain us (including diet, reproduction, etc.)

TL;DR Given modern man’s ability to understand the fundamentals of biology, personal management, scheduling and the like, a person should be able to live without excess. But I wouldn’t assume the desire to engage in excess could be gotten rid of. It seems ingrained from the hundreds of millions of years of mammalian evolution.